Chocolate Bunny

We had the pleasure of this little man's company the last couple weeks. He's so gnawing yummy I want to call him Chocolate Bunny. But you can call him Abe.

Here he is, very interested in Honey. Lori told me Honey allowed Abe to pet her. Later he became interested in specific tufts of her hair, and she was just not into that.

You can read all about Ted and Lori's amazing adoption journey on their blog, Our Own Rooney.


I'm returning from a New York but he won't be at the house. And I'm sad. Lori, bring Abe back soon!

Awww yummy chocolate bunny I miss you already...

Why It Matters

I'm nearing the end of my rewrite, the last rewrite before the end. Sometimes I feel like I'm rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic ... or on a gorgeous cruise ship to Alaska. The chairs are all gonna sink or they'll all get there. So why rearrange? Larry told me to fight against ennui. Well he didn't say ennui or weltschmerz or blasé-faire. I think he said fatigue. Fight fatigue. I'm trying. I've got Red Bulls in the fridge.

My friend Traci applied for a job she really, really wants. We talked about it yesterday: the enormous desire that threatens to dash our hopes if we don't get it ... 'hope deferred makes the heart sick.' There's an urge to go buddhist and kill off our desire. But I thought of what Henri Nouwen said: "Desire is the atomic energy of the soul." Desire for change motivates the political landscape. Desire to help the poor sends us to the inner cities and Africa and even Myanmar -- where other desires try to stop the help from reaching those who need it. Yes, desire creates unhappiness and evil. But it also motivates the best in us.

Traci sent me this quote of Frederick Buechner: "We must be careful with our lives, for Christ's sake, because it would seem that they are the only lives we are going to have in this puzzling and perilous world, and so they are very precious and what we do with them matters enormously."

So maybe I'm not rearranging deck chairs as much as I'm actually steering the ship. Or leading the charge. Okay then. Once more into the breach...

Sad Mac, Dead Mac

First let me say, my book deadline is 11 days away. So, four days after my Apple Care expired in February, my computer started having problems burning DVDs. Yes, four days after Apple Care expired. I've been giving my computer a lot of hard work with this book. But .. in the last month I started getting the "kernel panic" sign. Of course they don't tell you that's what it is, they just say, in four languates, YOU NEED TO RESTART YOUR COMPUTER. If they added the ACHTUNG, BABY, then it would really make my kernel panic.

When we were in Philly a week ago, I left my computer bag on the train platform and got on the train. I went into my own kernel panic, but GOD BE PRAISED, the train conductor called the next coming train, told the conductor to look for my backpack. During that epoch 30 minute wait, I had the chance to think: Okay, my editor has my latest draft. I sent a copy to a friend to look at just a day ago. I backed up all my files onto an external hard drive a month ago. I backed up the most recent files just days ago, onto my iPod, which is also in the backpack.Worst comes to worst, I'll buy a new computer. The next train arrived and they had the bag! NOTHING MISSING. But it got me thinking.

Three days later, back at home, Larry's computer went black. He took it into Apple store in Glendale. The guy at the Genius Bar may have been a genius at tech support but he was a Ree-Tard in his social skills. "Don't hear nothing. 50/50 chance you'll get your data back. Ten days, two weeks repair wait." And off he went with Larry's computer. His eight month old computer. Which IS under warranty. I tried to calm Larry. It was probably the mother board, not the hard drive. They can replace that and the hard drive may be OK.

"Unless there was a power surge and it fried the hard drive," our friend Matt said. He's in our small group. His PC is totally DONE and it's only like a year and a half old. "What I REALLY want is a macbook PRO," Matt drooled. When we closed our small group in prayer, our small group friend Traci prayed for Larry, Matt and Mandy, that their computer issues would be resolved. "Don't say that too loud," I said to Tracy. "Ask not for whom the PC bell tolls, it tolls for thee."

Monday night I got the achtung baby sign, and restarted my computer. I backed up my Book folder. I was working until 4:30 am, and sent my latest draft to my friend Mark in NYC.

12:30 Tuesday the bell tolled for ME. my hard drive shuffled off this mortal coil. I walked into the Apple store in Pasadena and walked out with what Matt has been drooling over. A macbook pro. And a dent in my wallet.

I used the Migration Assistant to transfer old files from my legacy ibook that originaly came with like OS 8, or "Calico."
Problem was, it also brought some old software codes so thing were wonky. I spent two hours reinstalling the system software. Matt sent me back my most recent copy of the book. I got all my files copied back onto my computer. It's now about 1:30 am and I'm starting to lose it. My cat is meowing and trying to sit in my lap and get me to feed her whipped cream and I about lose it.

NO, I will not let the Enemy grind me down. I just won't. You aren't going to win, Satan. You can go F yourself. In the Lord.

I got all the software reinstalled. Wednesday morning, iTunes wouldn't play. Went to the Apple store. The guy at the Genius bar said I didn't do a clean install. I need to totally wipe out the computer. Again. Long story short, by 3pm on Wednesday i am back. And I'm not going to let this stop me.

And Dianna, please PLEASE don't tell Joe. You just can't. It's not right.

Porno Ralphs Supermarket

With little time left on my book, I made my rare trip out of my bubble to go to the market and buy more paper for my printer. BTW, A Fresh and Easy opened up within walking distance of our house. Sure enough, as soon as F&E opened, we got flyers in our mailbox with the F&E logo, but they were actually exposés about F&E's parent company, Tesco -- claiming Tesco sold expired food, hiring cheap labor, etc. Some of the infractions went back ten years. I looked at the fine print and the authors of these flyer/exposés, were a Ralphs, Kroger, Vons, etc. I don't have to go back five years to remember two strikes by grocery workers demanding health care. A little of the pot calling the kettle black. But I needed paper from Staples on this day, so I stopped at the Ralphs next to it.

While standing in the checkout line I noticed some of the magazines. There on the lower shelves at a four-year-old's eye level was the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit edition. They've always been sexy but these days they look more like the cover of Hustler. The model's breasts were huge, and her 'top' consists of necklaces covering her nipples. I realize that men's magazines have gotten racier, but if you go to the SI swimsuit page, it looks more like you're being invited to enter the call girl website that took down Elliot Spitzer down.

The woman checking out in front of me was taking a while, so I had some time to sit there and stew. Why was that magazine placed in the check out line? Didn't they have a magazine section? And what was it doing at Toddler eye level? I also know our culture has been accused of being too puritanical. Maybe I'm too 'square,' but I don't think that throwing sex into everything actually demystifies it. I think it just makes it totally worthless. Every cover of US or PEople talks about "Jen and John's sexy weekend," "Brand and Angie's sexy new floor coverings," "Lindsay Lohan's sexy blackout weekend." enough enough. Can't we leave some mystery in life? I know some people think that if we demystify sex it won't hold power over us. But I've yet to hear of a man who felt looking at porn took away the itch to see more, or that looking through Playboy gave him the desire to meet a real woman with real breasts.

I paid for my groceries and went to speak to the manager. I told him about the cover. "I'm all for free speech," I said, "but a naked Hustler type magazine isn't appropriate for the average check-out aisle, and definitely not at child's eye level. I'd like the children in my family to stay children for a while."

Teh manager said he'd received many complaints about the magazine. However, "Corporate makes those decisions for us, and they have to stay there." "Corporate." The disembodied faceless word that gets the blame for everything.
"But the space they're sitting in doesn't even say Sports Illustrated.
"It says Time Specialties. It's a specialty slot." (Which also means it can sit there indefinitely, like People magazine's "The world's most beautiful/interesting/fascinating/nauseating people of 200x"
"Ma'am, it's not my decision. It's a corporate decision, if you want to pursue it with them..." he looked away.
"Yes, I'd like that."
The manager handed me a business card for "corporate." It listed a phone number for a customer comment line. Sure I got it. A taped message that gets erased at the end of the day.

I got online and sent an email instead, figuring it might be a little more productive than leaving a message on some phone machine. I stated my concerns above. I also added: "I'm all for freedom of speech. You've got an extensive magazine section. You DON'T NEED to have a big breasted topless Hustler model sitting at a child's eye level where she has no choice but to look at it. If we cannot govern ourselves and make sensible decisions about our freedoms, eventually someone will come and make our decisions for us. ... and by the way, this Ralphs was also selling EXPIRED milk. So next time you accuse Fresh and Easy of getting caught with their pants down, remember you just did too. And you've got your top off as well. I'd rather shop at Fresh and easy than Girls Gone Wild Ralphs."

I finally got an email back from Corporate. "Ralphs has decided to use the "blinders" over the magazine's cover so that the magazine masthead is visible, but not the pictures."

I'm going to check and see that they actually follow through. It's stil pretty tacky that you can't walk through a check out line and have to see one of those porn covers. But then again, Ashlee Simpson was sitting there in a microbikini on the cover of Cosmo.

That was last week. This morning I ran to Fresh and Easy for something. No magazines in the check out. When i got back I found a Victoria's Secret catalog in my mailbox. Courtesy of Ralphs maybe?

Weekend in Philly

Larry and I had a great time speaking at a singles conference at liberti church in Philadelphia. My friend Arlene invited us down; she's on staff at liberti. Who knew that after all those years of single desolation, we might have something to say to a bunch of cool, young people. But apparently cool, young singles really don't want to hear from some cool young couple how hard it was to wait until they were 24 to find each other. Hopefully we gave them some tips on how to avoid our mistakes, and some encouragement that even if they make our mistakes, they could end up married to the right person.

I loved watching Larry in his element, talking to their pastor about theology and post-modern church. Larry inspired the attendees that "marriage isn't the goal," he said. "Your life is the goal--living a big life God called you to live." I'm glad I got Larry before anyone else did. Not that there wasn't time or anything.

Both Arlene and the pastor, Jeff Bradford, graduated from Westminster Theological Seminary, with their faith intact. Arlene said a lot of people lose their faith in seminary, either in liberal institutions where they doubt God at all, or in conservative ones who argue over every jot and tiddle. One WTS professor has been suspended over mixing his jots and tiddles, and Arlene was pretty steamed over it.

Fortunately she found a great church in liberti. It's not one church. Jeff said they intentionally created three smaller churches in specific neighborhoods, to meet the needs of a specific demographic. Jeff said that once a particular group gets too big, they'll split. The point of church is not to be anonymous, Jeff said. The point is to be a community. Larry really enjoyed talking to Jeff about theology, the post-modern church and other assorted issues.

Arlene treated us to the Frida Kahlo exhibit at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. It was intense. They had an audio tour that accompanied the paintings. I didn't see the biopic "Frida," and knew very little about her. I finished the tour with a lot of respect for her work, a great deal of compassion for her life, and some bemusement at the curators. The way they described her fractured relationship with Diego Rivera was pathetic. The guy slept around. He had an affair with her sister. He even told Frida his doctor said he was physically incapable of monogamy. "Mira, Frida. Tengo un doctor's note!" The curators described them as unconventional and creative in their relationship. Try "dysfunctional," you maroons. It's all over her art. Pain and suffering. Yeah we got some great art out of it, but the woman was heartbroken!

Even more bemusing was the selection of souvenirs available for purchase in the museum store. Like, how about a coffee mug with Frida's face covered in bloody nails? Or that same image on a tie? Nothing says "hire me" like a tie with a Frida Kahlo's naked, nail-shot face face staring at you. Well you could get a job in the museum store. Or at a Fangoria Convention.

If you're well-to-do, you can get a replication of Frida's crown of thorns and dead hummingbird necklace for only $4,375!












Of course, in her painting you'll notice the thorns are making her bleed. They're meant to depict her agony attempting to win back her philandering fat tire of a husband. So if your wife buys this necklace, she might question your fidelity. That $4375 purchase may not be her last drain of your bank account before she files for divorce.

I am back to the book and working quickly and with concentration. Well except now. Actually I started this post because I was upset over a dolphin that died at Sea World, performing a stunt. I can't even bring myself to read the story. I know it's just an animal. I know that people died in gang shootings this weekend as well. But it still makes me really mad. For that reason there has to be an afterlife. There has to be a place where the world is put to rights, as N.T. Wright said.

Oh speaking of N.T. Wright, I think he might be on the s#*t list at Westminster. He probably described the atonement in words the profs didn't care for. Arlene is pretty angry at WTS right now. But not at Jesus--just at some of the people who claim to teach about him. Arlene's my kind of people. Thanks, girl!

My Mighty Mice

Reports of my literarydeath have been widely exaggerated. By me.
First, I talked to my agent, (who shall be Super Agent). She contacted my editor (who shall be Mighty Mouse) who got on the phone and got me an extra ten days on the deadline. They also cleared up some of the issues that prompted my disco freak out.
1) The ENTIRE book is not going to be disseminated on at the magazine editor's lunch on May 15. Just the first three chapters.
2) While I've only got ten more days on the deadline, there will be a month for tweaking, before it goes into production in New York.
Ten extra days to revise, a month of editorial tweaking, and then the book into production in New York. Into production, what a wonderful sound. Not to mention, they're throwing a magazine editors lunch! My agent and editors rule.
If you don't hear from me it's the usual. I'm writing. And praising my Mighty Mice.